49 children dead after train hits bus

Relatives of victims gather near the trainthat crashed into a bus carrying over 60 children.

Reuters

Forty-nine people, mostly young children, have been killed after a train collided with their bus in the central Egyptian province of Assiut.

The bus, which was taking more than 60 children on a trip organised by their nursery, was struck on a railway crossing in Manfalut, 356 kilometres south of Cairo, on Saturday morning (local time).

All but two of the dead were children, aged around four to eight, said a senior security official in Assiut.

The bus was broken in half by the force of the crash, with blood spattered on the front of the engine along with school bags and text books.

State television said that as well as 49 dead, 18 people were injured. A medical source said as many as 28 were injured, 27 of them children.

"They told us the barriers were open when the bus crossed the tracks and the train collided with it," said Mohamed Samir, a doctor at Assiut hospital where the injured were taken, citing witness accounts.

Assiut governor Yahya Keshk also said the railway crossing was open when the train hit the bus.

"The crossing worker was asleep. He has been detained," he told state television.

Witnesses described scenes of horror as the train collided with the bus.

"I saw the train collide with the bus and push it about 1 kilometre along the track," said witness Ahmed Youssef.

Officials said the level of destruction and mutilation made it difficult to count and identify the bodies.

Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi has ordered the prime minister, the ministers of defence and health and the governor of Assiut "to offer all the assistance to the families of the victims," according to the official MENA news agency.

Egypt's roads and railways have a poor safety record.

Egyptians have complained that successive governments have failed to enforce basic safety standards, leading to a string of deadly accidents.